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Waterways Recovery Group on the Chesterfield Canal

Thirteen members of the Waterways Recovery Group have spent this week helping in the restoration of the Chesterfield Canal at Renishaw in Derbyshire.

The thirteen are all volunteers who give up their holidays to go to workcamps because they want to see more of Britain's canals coming back to life. Some members of the Chesterfield Canal Trust have also been working at the site.

Waterways Recovery Group on the Chesterfield Canal They have been building a new washwall which will be on the outside of a bend just before the A6135 Main Road Bridge. The foundations had already been laid and they have gradually built up the wall with blockwork. Eventually it will be capped in stone and there will be moorings for boaters wishing to visit Renishaw Village or the Sitwell Arms Hotel.

Luckily, the weather has been pretty good for the volunteers, but there has been some frustration because of supplies of materials not arriving as arranged.

In March of this year, work finished on restoring a half-mile stretch of the canal just beyond the worksite. There had been a colliery and ironworks by the canal which had been derelict for very many years, so it was a major job to remove toxic waste and stabilise the land. A bridge to the new neighbouring housing estate has been installed and there are plans, currently awaiting grants, to build a superb park and play area. A previous Waterways Recovery Group camp had cleared trees and undergrowth to allow the restoration to begin.

Eleven miles of waterway and thirty six locks on the Chesterfield Canal have been restored so far. This week's work is another small step in closing the nine mile gap between the five navigable miles at the Derbyshire end of the canal and the Nottinghamshire and East Rotherham stretch which is navigable for thirty two miles to the River Trent. Plans and permissions are in place for much of this gap. A survey done by Gibbs Law in 2001 estimated that a fully restored canal would bring over 1000 permanent jobs and over £3 million per year in tourist spending.